Sprint CEO expects Palm Pre shortages, sleeping bag sales skyrocket

Know the best way to guarantee long lines outside of Sprint stores on June 6th? Have your CEO announce that he expects a shortage of Palm Pre handsets at launch. According to a Reuters transcript of Dan Hesse speaking to investors,

"We don't intend to advertise it heavily early on because we think we are going to have shortages for a while. We won't be able to keep up with demand for the device in the early period of time."

If true, if troubled Palm can't meet demand then this is certainly bad news for investors in a white-hot smartphone market with plenty to entice rejected Palm hopefuls this summer. Then again, Nintendo drove gamers nuts (and some would argue, artificially inflate demand) for almost two years with its chronic Wii shortages. Problem is, Palm isn't as fiscally solvent as Nintendo was in 2006... by a long shot.